Earth may owe some of its properties to a nearby star that blew up just as the solar system was forming. This pattern, which saw a supernova bubble envelop the sun and shower it with cosmic rays, may ...
Earth may have a moon today because a nearby neighbor once crashed into us, a new analysis of Apollo samples and terrestrial rocks reveals. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an ...
It may not feel like it, but everything in the universe is in constant motion. Our Sun, with all its planets, orbits the center of the Milky Way, flying through the cosmos at around 450,000 miles per ...
Astronomers have spotted an intriguing cluster of objects in the Kuiper belt, the enormous, donut-shaped region of icy objects beyond the orbit of Neptune. This latest “inner kernel” was identified by ...
Roughly four and a half billion years ago the planet Theia slammed into Earth, destroying itself, melting large portions of our planet’s mantle and ejecting a huge debris disk that later pulled ...
Simulations reveal that Jupiter’s rapid growth disrupted the early solar system, creating rings where new planetesimals formed much later than expected. These late-forming bodies match the ages and ...
How fast and in which direction is our solar system moving through the universe? This seemingly simple question is one of the key tests of our cosmological understanding. A research team led by ...
If you've ever wondered why we are here, then you can thank Jupiter for part of the answer. A new study from Rice University suggests that if it weren't for the gas giant, the Earth would have ...
Explore the immense challenges of traveling beyond our solar system as we examine the limits of distance energy and human biology. From the slow journey of Voyager 1 to ambitious concepts like laser ...
Illustration comparing the planets of the Solar System and the Sun on the same scale. The planets are shown to scale relative to each other but their distances are not. From left to right the bodies ...
Material around Chiron, a small icy world in the far reaches of the solar system, may be taking shape into a ring system of its own. The rare event is unfolding in real time, giving astronomers a ...
An interstellar object known as 3I/ATLAS has gathered a significant amount of attention in the planetary science sphere, and soon it will reach its closest point to the sun. 3I/ATLAS is the third-ever ...